In Brooklyn, an Alliance Is Broken in Quest to Unseat Towns

Representative Edolphus Towns returned to Brooklyn from Washington earlier than expected and wasted no time hitting the campaign trail.Credit
Jeremy M. Lange for The New York Times

Representative Edolphus Towns was scheduled to remain in Washington on Wednesday evening and through today, leaving to the weekend his plans to campaign in his Brooklyn district for a 13th term in Congress.

But Mr. Towns, a Democrat, changed his mind and flew back to Brooklyn Wednesday evening so that he could campaign in a race against two well-known opponents who have sought to do a rare thing in New York politics: unseat an incumbent Democratic congressman.

Mr. Towns spent yesterday campaigning at a subway station and visiting a center for the elderly in Williamsburg.

“I just love campaigning,” the 72-year-old Mr. Towns said in an interview on the way to La Guardia Airport after leaving the center. “I’m focused on my campaign. I don’t take anything for granted.”

Two months ago, the challengers — City Councilman Charles Barron and Assemblyman Roger L. Green — talked about joining forces and whether one should drop out of the race in order to defeat Mr. Towns. But since then, their deliberations have spiraled into a series of meetings, angry charges and accusations of betrayal.

In an interview this week, Mr. Barron said that he had reached an agreement with Mr. Green more than a week ago in which they agreed that Mr. Green would drop out and support the Barron candidacy.

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Charles Barron said that Roger L. Green did not honor an agreement to drop out of the race and endorse his candidacy against Representative Edolphus Towns.Credit
Angela Jimenez for The New York Times

“He gave his word that he would offer an endorsement of me,” Mr. Barron said. “Since then, he hasn’t returned my phone calls or acted on what he agreed to do. I find him to be dishonest, deceitful, disrespectful and disappointing.”

Mr. Green, in an interview yesterday, said that any conversations he had with Mr. Barron were intended to remain private.

“I don’t discuss the content of my private conversations with people in the media,” Mr. Green said. “I’m shocked and disappointed with the things he has been saying.”

Mr. Barron is known as an outspoken councilman who is energetic on the campaign trail. And he says it is time for Mr. Towns to move aside after more than two decades in Congress.

“We need new, energetic leadership that’s not going to sell us out and become complacent,” Mr. Barron said. “The incumbent is an ineffective leader who is a disaster on national issues.”

Both challengers have long contended that Mr. Towns is highly vulnerable. They have denounced him — as have labor groups — as a result of his vote for the Central American Free Trade Agreement. The agreement would lower barriers to trade and investment between the United States and six other nations, including Costa Rica and El Salvador.

Mr. Green and Mr. Barron have also criticized Mr. Towns’s record of missed votes and have taken issue with his history of support for the tobacco industry. They also say he is not widely available to constituents in the district.

But in an interview yesterday, Mr. Towns said that he was highly visible in the district and that he had also been an outspoken critic of the war in Iraq.

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Roger L. Green is accused by Charles Barron of not honoring an agreement to drop out of the race and endorse Mr. Barron.Credit
Angela Jimenez for The New York Times

“I work hard for my district and I’ve been able to deliver resources and services to the people in the communities in this district,” Mr. Towns said.

He added that voters in his Brooklyn district recognized the importance of re-electing him, noting that he would be in a position of leadership if the Democrats regained control of the House.

“I would be a chairman of a subcommittee, either Government Operations or Energy and Commerce,” Mr. Towns said. “The people know how important my seniority is to them.”

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Many Democratic leaders initially expected a vigorous challenge to Mr. Towns. But they now contend that he may survive because many of the unions have stayed out of the race, concluding that a well-financed Mr. Towns would easily survive a three-way race. They added that the skirmishing between the rivals and the uncertainty of Mr. Green’s campaign had diminished the viability of both campaigns.

The topic of Mr. Green’s candidacy — and whether he should pull out to help Mr. Barron defeat the incumbent — has been widely discussed among politicians and others in the 10th Congressional District, which stretches from East New York and Bedford-Stuyvesant through Fort Greene and into Brooklyn Heights and Cobble Hill.

Mr. Green has been far less visible than the typical Congressional candidate. Indeed, many Democratic politicians said they did not see him at the West Indian American Carnival Parade last Monday, a well-known photo opportunity for candidates during an election year.

Also, in his last campaign financial disclosure filing in July, Mr. Green reported having less than $5,000, far less than the nearly $70,000 reported by Mr. Barron in the same period. Both figures are far less than the $400,000 reported by the Towns campaign in the July filing.

Mr. Green said that he remained very much a candidate for Congress and that he had spent several days out of town on fund-raising trips to Washington and Chicago. “I’m definitely still in the race,” he said.

Mr. Green added that he had raised about $20,000 for his campaign in recent weeks. “We’re going to do well in this final week,” he said.

A version of this article appears in print on , on Page B2 of the New York edition with the headline: In Brooklyn, an Alliance Is Broken in Quest to Unseat Towns. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe